By Marilyn Miller
The “Third Floor Crew” is roaming around Minden. Somebody call the cops?? Hardly! They are “Feeding the Need!”
Chad Parks, youth pastor at First Baptist Church, is very proud of his young people and what they have accomplished in the Minden community over the past few years. And his vision for the future is to do more of it.
“That first year of COVID, our camp (Centrifuge) got canceled,” he recalled. “We started thinking of something else…and we came up with the idea of service.” They spent some time at Camp Harris (near Minden) hatching out a plan to do things for other people, which ultimately led to the teens changing lightbulbs for those who couldn’t, sending care packages to the Armed Forces and First Responders, or simply walking through neighborhoods and praying.
From that, “people started reaching out to us,” The Fuller Center in Springhill contacted them about painting a house in that town. This led to Chad contacting the people from the Fuller Center’s headquarters in Lanett, AL.
“That’s where we went (to Lanett) on our mission trip in 2021,” Chad recalled. “We got to put walls together. The kids actually looked at the blueprints and did it! And if they did it wrong, they took it apart and put it back together!” About 40 students, along with six or eight adults, worked on the project. Being able to focus five or six people to each wall section resulted in a two-day completion of the work. The wall sections helped “jump start” construction of the Chattahoochee Fuller Center Project’s 66th home build.
Because of their hard work, executive director Kim Roberts took the Minden group out for pizza. Their hostess was an energetic, handicapped lady who took serving the group of 50 in stride and ended up becoming a friend.
“God spread his (love) over our trip the whole time,” Chad said. Later, Kim asked him if he remembered Latrisha Finley. He could not recall the name, so she reminded him of the waitress the group had met at the pizza parlor. Kim said that she asked Latrisha that night if she needed a house. She did.
“We fixed up a house, not knowing who it would belong to,” the youth pastor said, “And then we actually got to meet the owner of the house that we built walls for…She has one leg and a daughter with special needs.”
With two days left, the teens were assigned the clean-up of a “trashed” house that had been gifted to the Fuller Project. The “Third Floor Crew” cleaned the interior of the house, took down an above-ground pool, and demolished a shed down to its slab. “The group had to call (a trash hauling service) five or six times,” Chad recalled.
The experience in Lanett spurred the FBC youth team on, making them feel that they could do something back home. They came up with the idea of preparing hot meals for the homebound, but a committee of youth leaders and adults couldn’t seem to make a plan that would work.
STEPPING UP
That’s when Bro. Bill Crider stepped up and handed Chad a list of 13 homebound citizens along with money for meals. “I’ve got you a start,” he said. That is where the “Feed the Need” project and name originated.
But what about the “Third Floor Crew”?
“It’s not camp, it’s what we do,” proclaimed t-shirts worn by the “Third Floor Crew,” a moniker springing from the relocation of seventh through 12th grade students to the third floor of the church building because of growth and maybe, just maybe, the joyous noise produced there…
This from Jodi Tuttle, a parent volunteer, who further explained that “we wanted to do something for our community after returning from the (Fuller) mission trip. We decided on the name ‘Feed the Need,’ but we hoped the program would meet other needs.” And that seems to be the case!”
The students are feeding 40 families two meals twice a month now…and that includes non-FBC members, since neighbors and other people have reached out with recommendations. There are 50 students who participate in “Feed the Need,” which includes seven youth from another church. The core group is 70 strong, but 12 to 15 rotate out periodically.
“We make 80 meals right now … two for each home,” Jodi, who purchases all the food, explained. “We use seven meal plans that revolve. Four teams of six prepare the food. The first team prepares the food at 8:30 a.m. on the designated Saturday. Team 2 wraps and packs everything, and the six members of Team 3 divide up and deliver. I prefer that adults do the driving, but we also have some of our college youth who come home to drive.”
Gail Downs is the dessert queen, serving 80 desserts, along with baking and serving a birthday cookie for anyone on their special day. The “Feed the Need” project is close to her heart, since she has elderly parents.
“She carries on, but we really need some help for her,” Jodi said.
The folks who receive the hot meals from the youth enjoy the food, but it is the visit that generates the most positive comments. “They say they enjoy the food, but PLEASE don’t stop the visits!” Jodi commented.
(See PART TWO next week!)